Must Read Op-Eds for July 20, 2011

[Murdoch’s] most revealing moment was when he volunteered his admiration of Singapore, calling it the most “open and clear society in the world.” Its leaders are so lavishly paid, he said, that “there’s no temptation, and it is the cleanest society you’d find anywhere.” It was instructive that Murdoch chose to praise a polished, deeply authoritarian police state. Maybe that’s how corporations would live if they didn’t have to believe in people.

The work of the tabloids can be irritating, provocative, ethically questionable and even (as the scandal spectacularly shows) highly illegal, but when practiced according to existing laws, tabloid journalism can be an important player in modern culture, helping to mitigate some of the central tensions in democratic society. Journalism has always been marked by a battle to define the boundaries of acceptable investigative behavior. The tabloids — just as they ought — constantly test those boundaries.

Bachmann’s candidacy poses the question of how to accommodate the evangelical worldview of women’s proper relationships with their husbands with what seems to me the inherently feminist notion of a female leader of the free world… I don’t lose sleep over Marcus Bachmann as Oval Office puppeteer, mostly because I cannot imagine Michele Bachmann making it there. But given where she is in the polls, it is fair and necessary to ask her about how she would reconcile the tensions between her understanding of the biblical view of woman’s role and the demands of the presidency. Come to think of it, I wouldn’t mind hearing from her husband, too.

While Reagan nostalgia endures, a number of Republicans have begun to admit the obvious: The Gipper would no longer be welcome on the GOP team. This spring, Mike Huckabee judged that “Ronald Reagan would have a very difficult, if not impossible time being nominated in this atmosphere,” pointing out that Reagan “raises taxes as governor, he made deals with Democrats, he compromised on things in order to move the ball down the field.”… Half a century after he left the party, the Gipper is winning one for the Democrats.

Maybe the best approach now is a short-term increase in the debt ceiling to provide a few months breathing space for additional negotiations; maybe the [Gang of Six’s] framework can be somehow linked to the approach being crafted by Democratic and Republican Senate leaders, allowing a debt-ceiling increase plus a mechanism for a new commission on how to reduce deficits. This much is sure: Given how hard it’s been to get to this moment of bipartisan progress, it would be terrible to see it go to waste.

Many of those who fought reform during the legislative process are now trying to slow down and weaken rules, starve regulatory agencies of resources, and block nominations so that they can ultimately kill reform. We will not let that happen. Too many Americans are still suffering from the pain of the financial crisis. We owe them a financial system with better protections against abuse and catastrophic risk. As secretary of the Treasury, I will recommend that the president veto any legislation passed by Congress that would undermine these vital financial protections.